Sunday, 24 August 2008

It seems the business of God giving people full authority is not found only in the gospels. Today's reading from Isaiah demonstrates clearly this fact (compare God giving Eliakim son of Hilkiah the key to the house of David with Jesus giving Peter the keys of Heaven). Nor is the fact that Jesus made Peter the rock on which he will build his church something new. There is a tradition in ancient Israel which said that when God saw Abraham, He exclaimed: "I have discovered a rock to found the world upon". See the similarities?

Why is it that only Peter out of so many of Jesus' disciples journeying with Him and other Jews flocking to Him who identified Jesus as "the Anointed One, the only begotten Son of God"? It's because Jesus' heavenly Father chose Peter not only for this but also to be the rock on which Jesus will build His church. Why is Peter chosen? We have no idea, but IMHO one of the reasons may be because Peter was flawed. He was impulsive, attention-seeking, fearful, quick to anger, etc. (note the number of times in the gospels when Jesus praised Peter for one action and immediately rebuked him for another). But God is not looking for perfect people to serve Him, but rather flawed sinners so that in guiding that sinner to serve Him He would not only heal that sinner but also show the world how powerful He is (after all, what power is demonstrated in polishing what is already perfect?) For His power is perfected in our weaknesses.

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Who am I? I'm just a simple person- named-Thomas-Xavier-Tan, male, Catholic, Chinese, Malaysian, born-on-16-June-1981, glasses-wearing, graduate-of-Malaysian-school-system, fantasy-novel-loving, pc-game-loving, non-gay, single... these are some of the adjectives that can be applied to yours truly.